Monday, January 30, 2006

The British Are Just Losing It

I've always thought of the British as a logical people, stoic and with a dry sense of humor. The Monty Python and the Holy Grail quote, "It's only a flesh wound", exemplifies that belief.

Then political correctness invaded Britain. Baa Baa Black Sheep was changed to Baa Baa Green Sheep. Can't say anything bad about anyone or the Metropolitan Police will investigate you for hate speech. A minority officer sues because he was promoted via affirmative action but wasn't competent enough to guard a royal and had to be reassigned.

I never thought I'd see British education go down the tubes, though. Here's what's happened at one school. Yes, it's only one school, but that's where it starts. Here in the US, the push to use purple pens instead of red pens for grading didn't spontaneously spring up across the country.

And no, this isn't the only sign of a downhill slide in British schools.

Sorry to break it to you Darren, but the Baa Baa Green Sheep myth was entirely invented by a newspaper reporter who, like yourself it appears, opposed political correctness. Yet without it, when would people have begun to realise that some words commonly used in the 1960's are unacceptable in the current decade, and indeed, were so 40 years ago? Political correctness is not about changing the Englich language, that is simply one branch of it. It is in fact, a way of empowering different groups of people and establishing some form of equality in society.

Surely by empowering the groups you empower the individuals within the group? It's not a question of 'Leftist social engineering' but of ideals. Through empowering the individual, the equality would be established, providing, that is, the power went to those who currently have little power. Unfortunately I personally have no concrete evidence to prove that the 'Baa baa green sheep' was and is a myth, but I have seen a documentary which discussed the matter and the producers of it had documents from the meetings at which the decisions were reportedly made and there was no record of it. The teachers in the area said they had not been told to stop teaching the song, and the only possible explanation was that the councils concerned ran a teacher training course in which they advised the people on the course to be sensitive and avoid words and phrases such as 'black sheep' and 'black mark'.

I believe in empowering people, and see this difference as a major difference between Left and Right in America. Empower the people and see where they go with their freedom. Empower the group, and everyone has to stay with the group. That's not the way it's supposed to be.

If you empower the group, people like Secretary Rice, General Powell, and Justice Thomas become Uncle Toms because they don't toe the group's party line. Yet, I'm glad those three individuals have succeeded and are doing the work they're doing.